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It's always annoyed me that Treknical books have ignored the novels. I can understand why, for the reasons Christopher posted (well, except the one about canon), but as far as I'm concerned a Trek with a story will always trump a dry book of facts, diagrams and statistics.

From what I've seen of Federation: The First 150 Years, they've borrowed a few cues from the old Spaceflight Chronology/FASA Trek timeline, which is pretty cool.

Did Beyer answer the questions that were submited in an anothe thread?

Check out the Voyager section. Kirsten herself invited questions, which she answered, along with questions from the floor, at a panel held at Shore Leave. Then she compiled her very comprehensive answers and put them back into the thread.

If so I'd like to enquire about whether or not there will be a "mass market" edition without all the fancy add-ons (seperate documents, fancy pedestal, cover, ect) with the same information?

If the publisher is wise, it would hold off on such an announcement, otherwise a lot of potential buyers will hold off to get a bare-bones version, and the original deluxe product would be quickly branded a flop.

They are attempting to tap into a different demographic with this item. It's not a "book", it's more like a toy/display item. Trends of ST non fiction in bookstores over the past decade have indicated that this area is now a rather niche market.

Not all of us are made of money after all...

If the original fails to excite the market, the price will quickly drop. People will list their purchases on eBay "Buy it now".

If it sells very well, the publisher may well do a mass market trade version. I understand similar releases have been done for other franchises.

Since its very beginnings, there have been wealthy fans and very poor fans. No change there. And products made to appeal to both groups. I well remember the outcry when Pocket Books released its first ST hardcover novel, "Spock's World" in 1988. No mention of any MMPB version until almost a full year later, when a reprint paperback did finally appear.

When I ran a ST club in the 80s and 90s, we had members who thought nothing about borrowing ST fanzines from friends and photocopying the entire contents (for "free", on their employers' photocopiers) while the original editors were still trying to make back their break-even printing costs on piles of unsold copies.

It's a frustrating reality that some fans simply can't afford to participate in fannish activities as fully as others. But we can't expect the licensees to run their companies like charities. They take the financial risk buying a license and then attempt to recoup, and even make a profit if they can.

^I don't think anyone is asking for CBS to run Trek as a "charity", just to keep in mind the realities of the economy as well as the general truth that when you make things less affordable then fewer people can afford them.